Continued Misery for the Palestinians

For the first time since 2006, more West Bank Palestinians support the political approach of Hamas as opposed to that of Fatah and its leader, Mahmoud Abbas, a new poll shows. And an overwhelming majority of Palestinians believe the results of the latest Hamas-Israel escalation that included Operation Pillar of Defense — Israel’s eight-day operation against terror targets in Gaza last month — prove that the armed struggle represents the best path to Palestinian independence.

The poll, conducted earlier this month by the Arab World Research and Development (AWRAD), a Ramallah-based research center, sampled 1,200 Palestinians from both Gaza and the West Bank. It set out to examine political opinions among Palestinians following Operation Pillar of Defense in Gaza and Mahmoud Abbas’s successful UN nonmember statehood bid.

While both events are overwhelmingly viewed as positive by Palestinians, adding popularity to both Palestinian factions, 42% of West Bank respondents said they preferred the approach of Hamas to that of Fatah, as opposed to only 28% who preferred Fatah’s approach.

_However_

Interestingly, more Gazans, 40%, said they preferred Fatah’s approach to that of Hamas, which rules over them. Thirty-seven percent of Gazans said Hamas’s approach was better.

Granted, only 1200 were polled so who knows if this is indicative of anything significant. Thoughts?

misery ? I can't think of any group of people more worthy,and deserving of the self imposed misery that the palestinians embrace . A popular illusion is that there is a difference in objectives and goals betwem Hama and Fatah, nothing can be further from the truth Both seek Israels utter destruction ,m both seek to remove jews from the land , both envision a Palestine "from river to sea ,with Jerusalem as it capitol . The only difference is, one of which method should be used to attain that common goal .
Long may they suffer , maybe [ not likely] in the course of banging their heads against the wall , some sense will be gained .

Hamas is a wing of the Muslim Brotherhood as well as representing a clan.

Hamas doesn't allow elections after winning ONE.

Hamas is known for throwing Fatah supporters off of buildings and shooting some in their hospital beds.

When Hamas came to power there were a few instances of Hamas gangs beating women to death for being seen on a beach with a man, though in two cases those men turned out to be their husbands (the reporting wasn't complete so those might be the only two cases or maybe the information came out later). I remember a doctor saying that he'd never seen such a brutally abused body, and I wonder if that was a hint that they raped the women as well.

On the other hand Fatah came out of the PLO and under Arafat's leadership was responsible for the massacre of an entire Christian village in Lebanon. Arafat was known for calling for a million martyrs to march to Jerusalem and kill the Jews while at the same time pretending he was for peace when speaking for the international community in English.

So yeah. Neither good, but I suspect that Fatah, being more of a kleptocracy than a theocracy would be better for the Palestinians. In either case the only freedom the Palestinians have ever fought for is freedom from Jews